Booking info/video/promo/contact
 https://thewholigans.com/contact-us/

40 years of Wholiganism

        1982-2022

The Wholigans are based in Florida USA & Toronto Canada, and call on various musicians worldwide,all of whom have been Wholigans for many years.
This enables us to practically tour anywhere worldwide.
See ‘Wholigan WHistOry’ & the family tree here

WHO are we …..Who Who

Roger Daltrey
https://thewholigans.com/roger/

Keith Moon
https://thewholigans.com/keith/


John Entwistle
https://thewholigans.com/john/

Pete Townshend
https://thewholigans.com/pete/

 

OUR STORY……..so far

1982-2021

   Woodstock

Las Vegas Hilton Theatre .

The Wholigans capture not only the sound and essence of The Who but could easily pass for the original members of The Who.
The band concentrates on the ‘Live at Leeds’ era , but their setlist contains a majority of the most popular material from The Who’s catalogue from day one until the final days of Keith Moon.

From the stage clothes to the authentic stage gear + capturing the mannerisms of The Who, The Wholigans bring back memories of a Who of yesteryear which has to be seen to be believed.

With the thrashing windmills of Pete Townshend to the mic swinging of Roger Daltrey,and the incredible drumming style of Keith Moon, combined with the thunderfingers of John Entwistle.
The Wholigans seem to have captured the total package…….that is  ‘The Who’.
 
Come See Feel & hear The Who’s music the way it was in the glory days of the 70’s and decide for yourself……..
WHO ARE THE WHOLIGANS

The band is regarded by fans of The Who as the worlds best WHO tribute, which is proven by the band being asked to headline WHO conventions worldwide.

The Wholigans have headlined 4 International WHO conventions since 2003. One in Hamburg Germany 2003 and three in London UK 03 & 06 &  in OCT 2010 and at each event it was sold out, with profits going to the Teenage Cancer Trust & the Meg Fox Foundation.
Lead singer Barry also sang on Saturday & Sunday at the 2013 convention in London.

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OUR STORY

The Story of The Wholigans (as told by Barry)

When I first left Newcastle England for Canada in 1980 I knew I wanted to rock, but The Wholigans and The Who were not even occupying any part of my brain, it really wasn’t my thing. I was into Black Sabbath, Ozzy, Judas Priest, Ufo, Status Quo, Budgie, Thin Lizzy.

So I join a band in Montreal called Nouveau Riche and we played originals (very 80’s metal), one day on the train to Montreal someone mentioned my passing resemblance to Roger to which I shrugged and said thanks I think. After playing for a while we added some cover songs just a couple of Who which I really wasn’t familiar with and after I sang them people came up and said how much they liked it, so we added a couple more. That went down well and the guitarist Mario Forlini closely resembled Pete so things were eerily falling into place (none of this was planned). We changed the name of the band to The Whooligans (note the 2 o’s)

The word ‘tribute’ was not around then in connection to bar bands, at least not as predominant as it is today.

Next up we move to Toronto and changed the name to The Wholigans and the band stayed at my place most of the time, we played a few gigs and eventually hired a new bassist Steve McKenna who was a great ox. Then we got a little more picky concerning our stage show and replaced the guitarist with a new Pete called Gerard Popma and on drums Paul Holman, the new guys really kicked my ass to play the part right as they were huge WHO fans.

A funny thing happened on the way to the forum….somewhere along the line I went from merely singing the songs to really enjoying singing them, the audience feedback was a big help and I found myself being consumed by The orrible oo! ….and loving it.

After a couple of years we changed the guitarist to a fella called John Walsh who looked like a mini-Pete and he was an integral part in making The Wholigans quite a commodity. He and I did not get along off stage (like Pete n Rog), but on stage it was a beautiful thing and we both knew it.

The band was very popular all over Canada and the USA throughout the 80’s.

Around 86 we hired Dave Smith(bass) who plays with the band till this day, mainly in Canada.

Eventually though, John (Pete) ssssss confusing I know ,John left and we hired another Pete called Pete Milner and a new drummer Darren Atkinson.

That version of Pete didn’t work out so the band dissolved after a year or so.

I moved to Florida in 92 , and took a 7 year hiatus but found myself itching to play again, so I auditioned tons of Who wannabees, and let me tell you…. that was rough !

I somewhat hired a new Pete , but then I got a phone call answering my advert, and the guy said to me

“Whoever you’ve got playing guitar now get rid of him because I’m your man”…..that guy was the current Pete, Chris Bacon. The man has got balls I tell ya, but you know what? He was right!

We auditioned a number of different players over a year and hired  a Florida only ‘Moon’, Chris Voll, he played 2000 till 2002? ish .
The current  Fl bassist is Mark Tinker.

Then one day I get a call from  Darren asking me if I’d be interested in playing up in Canada with a new Pete called Mike Legault, I said yes and we did a tour . Mike did one tour of the UK with us, but due to physical problems can no longer tour.

The regular players that play the majority of shows are

Barry Quinn aka Roger
Christopher Bacon & Bill Canell aka Pete
Jim Neu…Darren Atkinson aka Keith
Mark Alan….Dave Smith…..August Worley aka John

So come out and experience what it was like to see The Who in their prime, and bring yer earplugs 😉

Barry

From Newcastle to Canada to Florida  ‘Barry’s story’

PDF  with photo’s from the Newcastle Evening Chronicle 2003

Wholigan WHistOry

 

Newcastle Opera house 2003
(Barry’s hometown in England)

 

The reason why we do, what we do.